


Looks to the Moon gets her happy ending

by MetuSekhis



Category: Rain World (Video Game)
Genre: Angst, Drowning, Fluff, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, No Romance, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Spoilers, Suicidal Thoughts, it's rain world of course they want to die, moon needs to be protected at all costs
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-03-16
Updated: 2021-03-21
Packaged: 2021-03-24 02:47:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,287
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30065502
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MetuSekhis/pseuds/MetuSekhis
Summary: Moon spends most of her time drowning and in pain, but one day, instead of seeing a familiar white face approach her, three scavengers appear and decide to take her to the one responsible for her condition.
Relationships: Five Pebbles & Looks to the Moon (Rain World)
Comments: 4
Kudos: 11





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I was thinking about the lack of Rain World stories, and then I realized that literally nothing is stopping me from making my own

She didn’t know how long she had been drowning in the water, multiple cycles for sure, but it was hard to keep count when her entire being screamed in pain, the colossal pressure of the water seemed to always be on the brink of shattering her body, or – more accurately – whatever was left of it. She tried to not focus on the pain, which wasn’t an easy task, but after the hundreds of cycles she had spent underwater, she got quite good at it, quite good at ignoring the pain, quite good at not thinking.

It was the only way she found some sliver of peace in times like these, when she closed her eyes and stopped thinking it almost felt like she would disappear, and that simple fact was enough to give her the motivation to keep trying, because, maybe, one day she’ll truly disappear, she knew deep down that she was not made to ascend, that she was still bound to her can, to this prison that she once called her body, these days, she could barely feel it.

The only parts of her that were mostly intact were her puppet and five measly neurons, well, six now, thanks to that nice little creature, she hoped she wouldn’t forget it, it was the only thing that had brought her at least some sense of relief, she wanted to forget a lot of things, but not that little creature, not one of the only beings that had helped her feel better.

She clutched her neurons tighter, _Don’t think _, she told herself, her entire body felt like it was burning, water filling every nook and cranny, she could feel the rain pounding against her, crushing parts of her under its weight, praying would amount to nothing, she knew that, but still, every time, she still prayed for the rain to finish her once and for all, for this to finally be over, she would just wake up again of course, the cycle never stopped for them, but at least she would have her fully functioning body back.__

____

She often had that type of wishful thinking, because what else could she do except wish for it to be over? She was trapped and helpless, she had been for so long now, she had nothing now, except her six neurons. She clutched them tighter, they gave her some comfort, the only comfort she had really, and finally, after God-only-knows-how-long, she managed to stop thinking, and the pain finally stopped.

____

When she opened her eyes again, she was dry, back on her small island, finally, some peace, she looked up, making sure all of her neurons were here, thankfully, none of them were lost in the flood, then she looked in front of her, nothing seemed to be coming, the little creature probably wouldn’t come today, so she decided to relax – as much as she could anyways – before the rain inevitably came back.

____

Just as she was about to close her eyes again, she saw something approaching, but it wasn’t the small white creature she was now used to, two- no, three scavengers were here, maybe they wanted to give her something? It was quite rare to see scavengers here, as they were not the best swimmers, they preferred much drier land, plus, they seemed to dislike iterators, maybe they knew they were the ones causing the rain? She shook her head, they were smart, but not that smart. Even though they disliked iterators, they didn’t seem to mind her all that much, probably because it was obvious she wasn’t well, which was an understatement honestly.

____

The three scavengers were now in front of her, and she could see them much clearly, the biggest one, who she assumed was the leader since he was the one that seemed to be directing them, had pale brown skin, long antlers and curious blue eyes as well as three spears strapped on his back and what seemed to be a weird silver scarab on his belt, she wandered what it was, as she had never seen it before.

____

The other two seemed to be twins as they were nearly identical, they were both a dark shade of gray, with much shorter antlers than the leader and long whiskers, the only thing differentiating them from each other was the color of their eyes, one of them had yellow eyes and the other green eyes, they were also carrying weapons on their backs, they signed at each other and sometimes pointed at her, so she assumed they were probably talking about her.

____

The scavengers hadn’t actually interacted with her yet, they mostly “talked” to each other, occasionally glancing at her, this would probably be much easier if they had the Mark of Communication, but oh well, this would have to do, she tried waving at them to get their attention, they glanced at her and promptly ignored her, they seemed to be having a debate, the leader seemed annoyed as he bristled slightly, after a few more seconds of signing, they stopped, seemingly done with their exchange.

____

The leader finally looked at her and took the small scarab off his belt, before handing it to her, _What am I supposed to do with this..? _, maybe this was supposed to be a gift? She honestly had no idea, she had no memories of ever seeing a scavenger with this before, she glanced at it, briefly examining it – yup, that sure was a nice silver scarab – before looking back at the leader, he used the spear in his hand to point at the scarab before pointing it at her, which was of no help whatsoever, the leader seemed to get more annoyed by the second, briefly rubbing his face with his palms, the two other scavengers looked at him as if they were saying _See? Told you that wouldn’t work _, he abruptly grabbed the scarab back before going behind her, due to the way her robotic arm worked, she wasn’t actually able to turn around, so she waited patiently to see what he was actually trying to do, he poked around her back, seemingly searching for… something?____

_______ _ _ _

After a few seconds, he stopped, and she could suddenly feel the scarab move around on her back, the leader went back to his original position before puffing his chest at the other two, who actually seemed impressed he had figured… well she didn’t know what he had figured out, but he seemed really proud, she could still feel the scarab moving around her back, and for a second she thought it was just some kind of weird scavenger decoration, but then it stopped, and she could feel it detaching her mechanic arm from her back.

_______ _ _ _

OK now she was really panicking, she desperately tried to turn around to grab it, letting out panicked screams as she could feel it detaching her mechanical arm, how did it even know how to do that? She was pretty sure anyone with that knowledge died a long, long, long time ago, and yet here it was detaching it with no difficulties as she was screaming and trying to grab it.

_______ _ _ _

The scavengers didn’t care at all that she was screaming, they were just watching, waiting for it to finish what it was doing, and now she was even more confused as to what they were doing, were they _sent _here? Her memory seemed to stirr as she thought about that, a vague red silhouette carrying a spear on its back appeared in her mind, but disappeared as quickly as it came, as the scarab had finished what it was doing.__

____

_______ _ _ _

____

As her only support was detached from her, she immediately fell face first onto the ground, her body not made to handle her own weight.

____

_______ _ _ _

____

She propped herself up on her elbows and looked at the scavengers, had she always been this heavy? Well, her puppet wasn’t really made to be under normal gravity, nor was it made to be detached from her mechanic arm, so it wasn’t actually that weird, what she definitely wasn’t ready for was how empty she felt, almost the entirety of her body was now gone, as bad as it was before, at the very least she could still vaguely feel most of it, now she didn’t feel anything except her puppet, it was… terrifying, she was now even more aware of how weak she was, now, a wild creature could just grab her neurons and she wouldn’t even be able to push it away, or they could simply push her into the water and she would be stuck in constant pain for the rest of her existence, not that she wasn’t in pain already.

____

_______ _ _ _

____

As she was thinking of said pain, she realized she wasn’t suffering anymore, most of her memory was still lost, but now… now she could-

____

_______ _ _ _

____

Her musings were interrupted by the leader of the scavengers waving its spear in front of her, it started drawing something in the dirt of her small island, a rectangle with 4 legs that she assumed was supposed to be an iterator, she looked at the scavenger and then pointed at herself, it shook its head and scribbled its drawing, it then drew five circles instead, _Five..? _, the scavenger noticed her confusion and grabbed a nearby rock, showing it to her, _Five rocks? _, suddenly, it dawned on her.____

____

__________ _ _ _ _ _ _

____

_Five Pebbles. ___

____

____________ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

____

Anger surged through her as she remembered the one responsible for all of her pain, but it was quickly silenced and replaced with sadness, he wasn’t the villain, he was just frustrated, stuck in his can, alone with his anger and the Rot slowly consuming him, he was just trying to end this cycle and finally ascend, like the rest of them, it didn't excuse his actions, but it at the very least explained them.

____

____________ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

____

When the scavenger saw she had calmed down, he waved his hand at the other two, and they quickly came towards her, each one grabbing one of her arms before putting her in a sitting position, she was impressed by how easily they moved her despite her weight, she knew scavengers had really strong arms (that they typically used to chuck spears at overseers) but still, the leader pointed again at its drawing, it drew a small ball with an antenna on each side, two eyes and a big dot on top (she assumed it was supposed to be her head) on top of the pebbles, then drew an arrow pointing at them.

____

____________ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

____

_They’re going to take me to Five Pebbles. _The twins lifted her up and put her on the leader's back, tying her there with some rope.__

____

____________ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

____

__She had no idea what to think of this, on one hand, she didn’t know if she should trust these scavengers to take her there in one piece, but on the other hand, she didn’t know if she actually had a choice, oh well, it’s not as if she had anything better to do, she hoped that – at the very least – the trip to Pebbles would be uneventful._ _

____

____________ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

____


	2. Chapter 2

The trip to Five Pebbles was a goddamn nightmare.

If she had to guess she’d say it was for two main reasons: the scavengers weren’t good swimmers, and they couldn’t jump, which meant they had to take a lot of detours, sleeping in shelters with them was also really hard, because most of them were small and weren’t made to fit four medium-sized creatures, plus after a while it got really awkward to stare at them while they were sleeping, another thing that considerably slowed them down was that they also had to protect her neurons, she wished she could tell them she was sorry for being such a burden, but they wouldn’t understand her, so all she could do was hope that her – limited – facial expressions transmitted her guilt.

Trying to get a vulture to let go of her leg while spears were being chucked left and right by the scavengers was also… an experience

After an absolutely excruciating number of cycles, they finally got to Five Pebbles, but she knew that going through Unfortunate Development with three very noisy scavengers was forever going to stay engraved in her memory as one of the worst moments of her life, just thinking about it made her shiver, and she didn’t even have skin.

But finally, after all of… _that _, they entered Five Pebbles’ chamber, she didn’t really know what to expect, during the trip, she didn’t really have time to think about what she was going to say when she actually met him, she was mostly focused on – well – surviving, should she shout at him? Get angry? She was finally, _finally _, able to do something to him if she wanted to, she would be lying if she said she hadn’t thought of hurting him, of making him pay for all of her pain, she wasn’t proud of herself for thinking that, but who could blame her, drowning on the regular can make people a bit salty.____

____“Hello Moon, it has been a while, has it not?”_ _ _ _

____She was a bit taken aback by how casual he was being, but before she could respond, the scavengers waved at Five Pebbles, they were seemingly impatient and clearly unhappy to be here, the iterator glared at them._ _ _ _

____“Excuse me Moon, I have to take care of them.”_ _ _ _

____She watched, bewildered, as Pebbles signed something at them, the scavengers nodded a few times, clearly tense, the “conversation” was over in a few seconds as Pebbles made them exit the room before deactivating the artificial gravity, Moon felt a weird sense of nostalgia wash over her, it had been a long time since she was in anti-gravity, but this time she didn’t have much control over her body, so she simply floated in place, relaxing as she didn’t feel the weight of her own body anymore, her six neurons floated lazily all around her._ _ _ _

____She looked back at Five Pebbles, who was watching her curiously._ _ _ _

____“I assume you were the one to make that silver scarab.”_ _ _ _

____“Yes, I am quite proud of it, but pleasantries aside, I assume you have a lot of questions.”_ _ _ _

____“Yes, why did you help me? I have trouble believing it was out of the kindness of your heart.”_ _ _ _

____Pebbles seemed to frown at that._ _ _ _

____“I am not known for my kindness, but know that I am not emotionless, I do not like seeing you in pain, and since all of my efforts towards ascension have been fruitless thus far, I figured dedicating some cycles towards helping you wouldn’t hurt anyone.”_ _ _ _

____“Well… thank you, I am extremely grateful for that, despite my grudges against you I can recognize that you have put real effort into helping me.”_ _ _ _

____“Yes, yes, it isn’t important, I figured I could at least get you somewhere dry.”_ _ _ _

____“Although I am curious, how did you get the scavengers to cooperate?”_ _ _ _

____Pebbles shuddered, as if remembering something traumatic._ _ _ _

____“I got the idea after seeing No Significant Harassment’s helper, but his species didn’t have the strength necessary to carry you, so I resigned to using scavengers, I tried communicating with them using overseers, you cannot even begin to fathom how many of them were stabbed in this endeavor.”_ _ _ _

____“How long did that take..?”_ _ _ _

____“Three hundred twenty seven cycles, but once I managed to get them to come here it was relatively easy.”_ _ _ _

____“Relatively?”_ _ _ _

____“They threw spears at my face.”_ _ _ _

____“Of course they did, why didn’t you give them the Mark? It would’ve made things at lot easier for the both of us.”_ _ _ _

____“They threw spears at my face.”_ _ _ _

____“And they cooperated because..?”_ _ _ _

____“I promised I would give them pearls.”_ _ _ _

____“That was rather obvious, but how are you going to give them the pearls?”_ _ _ _

____“I won’t, I do not need them anymore and they do not have any power over me, why would I keep my promises? They are animals.”_ _ _ _

____Moon suspected that it might also be related to the fact Pebbles simply didn’t like them, but she didn’t say anything, and they fell into an awkward silence, once Pebbles realized the conversation was over he went back to work, focusing deeply and closing his eyes, the blue iterator had no idea what she was supposed to do, she couldn’t really do anything except float there – she tried her best to not bump into Pebbles – and look at the ceiling, she could also read the pearls in the room if she wanted to, but she didn’t know if Pebbles would consider that as invasion of privacy, so she simply waited for something to happen._ _ _ _

____She definitely wouldn’t complain though, she was dry and wasn’t in pain, she hadn’t felt this good in so long, although only being able to feel her puppet was weird, it was as if she was missing her limbs, she tried not to focus on the sensation, but it wasn’t easy, as she didn’t have any distraction, she tried not to think, to stop feeling, like when she was being crushed by the rain, _Stop thinking _, thinking is pain, thinking hurt, she wanted the pain to stop, why was she always in pain? Even after all of that the pain wasn’t over.___ _ _ _

______Before she even realized it, she was breathing faster, life was pain, the cycle never ended, the pain was endless, she couldn’t ascend, she would always be in pain, she tried clawing at her skin but the metal was for too resistant, she wouldn’t be able to take her life even if she wanted to, why was she forced to live? Why did that creature have to revive her? Why did the Ancients give them such a cruel task? She just wanted to _die _-___ _ _ _ _ _

________“LOOKS TO THE MOON!”_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

________She stopped clawing at her skin and looked at the one who had just screamed her name, she had never heard Pebbles scream, he was always calm and composed, and the sound reverberated against the walls of the room, making her wince in pain, she didn’t mind, she had felt worse._ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

________“I’m… I’m deeply sorry, I was lost in thought.”_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

________Pebbles hummed in thought._ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

________“I see, I should have known all those cycles spent under the rain would have lasting consequences on your mental health.”_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

________He started writing something down on a nearby pearl, _Probably something related to me _, she thought.___ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

__________“Pebbles…”_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

__________“Yes?”_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

__________“How many cycles has it been since I… since I crumbled to pieces..?”_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

__________There was along pause, she wasn’t sure if Pebbles was simply uncomfortable or was just calculating the cycles, he had always been very good at hiding his emotions._ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

__________“Five thousand three hundred twenty seven cycles.”_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

__________Oh._ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

__________It was… so much more than she remembered, she looked at the six neurons still floating all around her._ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

__________It was probably a good thing most of her long term memory was gone._ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

__________“I’m sorry I didn’t think of helping you sooner.”_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

__________“It’s… it’s OK, but could you do me a favor..?”_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

__________He looked at her, curiosity visible in his eyes._ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

__________“I… this is a weird request but… could you hold my hand for a bit?”_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

__________God she was so pathetic, panicking like a baby in front of one of the only people who had helped her, and now she was asking him to hold her hand because she wanted reassurance, like a child._ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

__________Surprisingly, he didn’t refuse her request, and grabbed her hand, squeezing it a bit, although he held it awkwardly, but Moon couldn’t blame him, he had literally never held anyone’s hand before, he was trying his best._ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

__________Despite the fact they were both made out of cold metal, Moon could have sworn his hand felt warm._ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Writing dialogue for Moon and Pebbles while staying in character is much harder than I initially thought, also, english isn't my first language, so please tell me if some of the sentences sound weird or if there are grammar mistakes.


End file.
